I've been with Amazon for about 2 years now, I'm an L4 salary who handles multiple projects and balances a workload as heavy if not heavier than many of my L6 counterparts. I'm a Program manager with my PMP that I recently acquired and feel like it's been to no avail. Not only was I not compensated for the 3.5k I spent to get the PMP certification, but after acquiring it I saw no pay increase or compensation. My manager says that the plan is to push for my L5 early Q2 2023 but even then the estimated TC according to them is only around 100k. I feel like I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. Below are the options I'm contemplating. Any input helps, thank you! TC: 89k YOE: 2
I WFH but I'm in CA so expenses are nuts
89k in CA is bad news
nothing sinks your career faster than a manager that doesn't appreciate you. apply external and leave
This.
What I would do is interview elsewhere, get an offer and talk to your manager asking for 400k/yr and a level up. If they say no then say you're going to be leaving in two weeks as you have an offer for that number elsewhere. If they call your bluff have the offer letter but do not show the company. For the love of God don't show or talk about the company you'd be joining. This gives your manager the opportunity to very quickly run up your pay and level or you're out and make the same elsewhere.
400k? This is horrible advice. That person would get smoked immediately. Lmfao "Just get another offer". have you not seen the markets? Who the fuck is paying 400k for an L4/L5 non-dev? Calm down there cowboy
Lmaooo thanks for the comment man but gotta agree with above, 400k is definitely a bit out of reach right now with my YOE and being non tech
Where are you based? Comp would seem low for either coast of the US but not out of range for Europe, Canada, or the middle of the US. Amazon never promotes or compensates on the basis of credentials, just about how you perform at your job. I don’t know why anyone would have told you differently. Don’t apply for internal L5 roles. You can’t get promoted transferring, and you won’t get a promo timeline better than 6 months if you do move. If you’re doing a lot of work but none of it is being done with an approach, scope, and level of ambiguity as expected of an L5 according to the role and level guide, you’ll have a heavy workload but not get promoted. That sounds like what may be happening as you compare yourself to your L6 peers. It’s not about how many hours you work, it’s about how you do your job. Definitely get a mentor and seriously listen to their advice. Look at the role and level guide with them and talk about “how would I approach this problem if I was at L5?” Also, ask them if the work you’re doing is scoped to L5 - and if not talk with your manager about that immediately. If you do decide to leave, don’t expect to get a big promotion out of it just because Amazon is on your resume. Your 2 YOE will pop out a lot faster than having a PMP. And the best thing you can do is to learn as much as you can from your peers and mentors before you go. Source: former Amazon TPM and manager, drove through multiple ic4-5 promotions.
Thanks for the reply, I'm based out of Los Angeles, so definitely a bit low being out here. I actually have a mentor who I've been speaking to on a biweekly basis who's an L7 here at Amazon, I manage my projects end to end and have been trying to be super conscientious of my work. My work does also require me to travel 40-50% of the time for my projects which makes managing my projects that much more difficult. But I definitely understand where you're coming from and that's part of the reason I put this post up, I know I don't have too many YOE which is why I feel like I'm stuck in a weird place where I kinda have to take the low pay until my YOE catch up a little. But open to any other input you may have
Nontech program managers arent paid well even in faangs
Any advice on how to get into a tech role, seems like it's rather difficult to get my foot in the door since qualifications typically require background I don't have
Move to Product Management
By your metric, if I work 18 hrs a day, I should be CEO ?
Not referring to my workload by hours spent, but by scope of work, but hey maybe you should be a CEO Mr. Asshat
Apply externally and then boomerang at a higher level and better package.
If you didn't get L5 promo after 1.5-2 years, GTFO. Average is around 1.5 years for L4 to L5
Went L4 hourly to L4 salary to my understanding that was the promo path I had to take to get to L5
So you became full time after being a contractor? If so that's probably why, they might not count your contractor experience in promos. I got both Product Managers and SDEs promoted to L5 in 1.5 years pretty easily, but they were all salaried full time employees for the entire period
You can’t get promoted by changing team internally.
Textbook Carrot on a stick you should leave asap